Corning Inc. has been granted a license for patent rights to reverse transfection method technology for the drug discovery research market by the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, through Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), its licensing agent. Corning will use the intellectual property with fundamental technology it previously licensed from Aastrom Biosciences Inc. to enhance the development of its molecular and cell culture applications. Corning holds exclusive rights to Aastrom's surface-mediated cell transfection technology, used to increase the frequency and efficiency of introducing foreign genes into cells.